The keyboard sonatas of Pietro Domenico Paradisi are robust, inventive works, first published in London in 1754. Anna Paradiso misses not a whit of the interest the Neapolitan composer embedded in this music, and she adds considerable invention and drama of her own in these entirely satisfying interpretations. Performing on harpsichord, fortepiano and clavichord, Paradiso finds a world of variation in these compelling works, some of which broach a chromaticism that seems more of the 19th than the 18th century.

On the page, Paradisi’s sonatas look a bit like those of his fellow composer from Naples, Domenico Scarlatti. Much of the writing is in two voices, which range freely over the keyboard with scales and arpeggio figures racing up and down, punctuated by rhythmically propulsive figuration. The first movements are in binary form, like those of Scarlatti, but are followed by second movements in a variety of styles, including gigues, a minuet and a ravishing aria, marked Larghetto.

The resemblance to Scarlatti doesn’t minimise the individuality and brilliance of Paradisi’s idiom, which often feels more of the theatre than the keyboard. The performer’s decision to use the full panoply of keyboard instruments available at the time these works were published (minus, of course, the organ), is brilliant. It pushes this music to its extremes, and it is music that wants that push. In the Andante of Sonata No 4, performed on clavichord (a restored 1792 instrument originally from Sweden), it sounds as if she is alone in a room, improvising on a lute, exploring the possibilities between pianissimo and silence, an impression not dispelled by the occasional dry thump of a left-hand octave or four-note chord. In the Larghetto of Sonata No 3, performed on the harpsichord (a contemporary instrument based on a 1730 model by Nicolas and François Blanchet), deft use of the buff stop gives textural variety and increases the drama, which at points in the middle of the movement almost approaches the chromatic intensity of the 25th variation of Bach’s Goldbergs.

Paradiso is a daring performer, including performing the only work here that is even modestly well known – the ‘toccata’ second movement from the Sonata in A major – on the fortepiano (a restored 1802 Broadwood). Paradisi lived a long life and died in 1791. These works were written decades earlier than the turn of the 19th century, and might seem alien to the fortepiano’s tonal world. Yet the dynamic nuance of the instrument and its range of texture perfectly suit this sonata, especially the first movement, which is one of the delights of the disc. Recovering and restoring all the other sonatas is the performer’s welcome gift to all us.